You’ve experienced muscle soreness after a workout, right? You give it your all at the gym, on the tennis court, in the pool — and then, ouch. Well, here’s an easy, safe, natural and inexpensive cure that will mean you don’t have to treat yourself so gingerly — take ginger!
Long used in traditional Indian and Chinese medicine as a remedy for ailments such as nausea, indigestion, flatulence, flu, diarrhea, motion sickness and osteoarthritis, ginger (Zingiber officinale) now has been scientifically proven to be helpful in relieving muscle pain and soreness. A recent study shows that taking daily doses of ginger can ease the aches and pains that follow strenuous exercise.
THE GINGER STUDY
Researchers at the University of Georgia studied whether daily doses of ginger can inhibit exercise-related muscle pain. One group of 34 participants consumed capsules filled with two grams of raw (untreated) ginger (this is equivalent to the 500-mg capsules of raw ginger sold in health-food stores). A second group of 40 people took two grams of heat-treated ginger (earlier studies had shown that heating ginger may increase its pain-relieving properties). A third group took a placebo. All participants consumed their capsules for 11 consecutive days — seven days before… the day of… and three days after a high-intensity weight-lifting session (designed to induce muscle pain and inflammation) performed on the eighth day.
Measuring several different variables, including effort and pain intensity (reported by participants)… range of motion… strength… and levels of prostaglandins (inflammation-mediators involved in pain), researchers found that…
- Participants taking daily raw ginger supplements reported 25% less exercise-induced pain than the placebo group.
- Participants taking daily heat-treated ginger had 23% less pain than the placebo group.
WHY GINGER HELPS
Patrick O’Connor, PhD, led the research study. He told me that ginger works much like nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs, such as aspirin and ibuprofen) do, by inhibiting prostaglandin production. Unlike NSAIDs, ginger also serves to desensitize a type of pain receptor found in the peripheral nerves known as TRPV1 and it also reduces the body’s production of inflammatory chemicals called cytokines, said Dr. O’Connor. These results were published in the September 2010 issue of The Journal of Pain.
Muscle aches and pains are common among athletes — particularly serious ones, older ones and weekend warriors. If you fall into any of those categories, you may want to consider taking ginger to minimize your post-workout agony. Although this study didn’t test the efficacy of ginger against NSAIDs, Dr. O’Connor told me that the study participants experienced greater pain relief than did those in similar tests of ibuprofen and naproxen, but without the NSAID-related risks of stomach irritation and ulcers.
TRY IT AT HOME
If you’d like to give this a try, Dr. O’Connor suggests purchasing ginger capsules that contain a standardized extract with a gingerol content of 5%. Take one two-gram daily dose for several days before and after planned workouts.
If you love the taste of ginger: Kitchen equivalents are as follows — a two-gram dose of raw ginger in capsule form is roughly equivalent to one teaspoon of powdered ginger… 2 milliliters (about one-half teaspoon) of ginger extract … or (my favorite) one tablespoon of finely chopped fresh ginger.
